Fatalistic Outlook
by Desbelleschoses
Summary: After a misunderstanding between Tenzo and Iruka, Kakashi and Tenzo have an argument about commitment. Kakashi ANBU era. KakaYama. Part 5 of Unofficial Rulebook for Reckless Ninja series.


"I didn't tell you this just so you could get angry with me!"

"I'm not mad at you; I'm mad at the little brat."

"Kakashi, there's no way he could've known. Nobody knows. We agreed on that! We had this conversation."

"Why're you trying to make me the bad guy here?"

"Because nothing happened! You're making this so much bigger than it needs to be."

"Why did you say yes?"

"Excuse me?"

"Why did you tell him yes?"

"For the love of – I can go get ramen with my _friend_ , Kakashi. What, am I not allowed to be friends with guys anymore?"

"Not ones that're in to you."

"Do you hear yourself right now?" Tenzo threw his hands into the air in exasperation. "Iruka has a crush on me. So what?! I wouldn't tell you that you can't hang out with… I don't know… Aoba!"

"Because that isn't a problem." Kakashi knew, in his rational mind, that he was being unreasonable. Why did this bother him so much? He didn't see Iruka as a threat; his bravado didn't even consider it a possibility. So why couldn't he stop acting like a jackass? He crossed his arms, the fingers on his left hand drumming rhythmically against his bicep.

"I don't know what you want me to say. Here I am, being honest with you, telling you what happened, because I _respect_ you. I respect _us_ enough to have this fight in the first place. I didn't have to tell you that Iruka and I got ramen today, and I _sure as hell_ didn't need to tell you he kissed me. And yet," Tenzo gestured around him with his arms.

Kakashi's eye flashed at the reminder.

"We haven't even talked about what we are, you know. Excusive, open? You might not care, but I do. And clearly, we need to figure it out, because this is getting out of hand. You're getting out of hand."

It took a conscious effort for Kakashi to unclench his jaw. He raised his thumb to scratch his scarred eyebrow beneath his hitai-ate, and his lips parted in a laborious sigh. "Okay," he decided. There was no way he was getting out of this conversation. "Let's talk."

Tenzo wasn't sure he'd get this far. He hesitated as he searched for the right words, rubbing his brow with his fingers as the tension behind his eyes began to recede. "I need to know, in no uncertain terms, what's going on here."

Kakashi bent his arms at the elbows and held his hands out to his sides, palms up. "You know I'm not good at that." Speaking candidly, especially about his emotions, was something he'd forgotten how to do long ago. Tenzo had broken past his wall that kept people at arm's length, but, until now, he'd been able to turn a blind eye to what had happened. It wasn't something he wanted to think about or confront. Yet, as the man stood before him, leaning slightly forward as he pressed, forcing his way in, Kakashi knew he had to make a choice.

Tenzo clapped his hands together, lifting them to his lips almost in prayer as he closed his eyes. With a deep breath, he opened them and lowered his hands. "Okay, baby steps, then." Kakashi wasn't getting out of this unless he jumped out the window. "What happened in Grass country. You made it clear that you weren't just flirting for the fun of it. But I need to know what that meant to you, and don't lie to me just to spare my feelings. Was it just sex to you? Something to resolve the tension?"

Kakashi sat on the edge of his bed and leaned forward, resting his forearms on his knees. In his nervous habit, he rubbed the hair on the back of his head. "No," he admitted. After their tumble, they hadn't made another attempt at recreating the moment. He knew he'd pulled back. He was afraid; he'd never admit it, but he was. He'd gotten by thus far by calling it a one-night-stand, an error in judgement. He was lying to himself. Even though he knew this, the lie helped soothe the wound. Putting it out in the open like this, being honest, felt like salt on raw skin.

"I asked you what you want. You said me. I need to know what you meant by that."

Yep. This was what they were going today. They were going to fight. Kakashi was terrible with words, and a misunderstanding was looming in the distance. He'd say something wrong, Tenzo would yell, he'd yell back. The situation would escalate, and the odds of the whole thing ending in make-up sex was very, very low. "I meant…" he paused, because ending the sentence with 'what I meant' wasn't an option. "I didn't say it just to get laid, if that's what you're asking. It was more than that."

"How much more?"

"Dammit, Tenzo! I'm trying here." Kakashi regretted snapping as soon as he did so. He chewed the inside of his cheek before speaking again. "It meant… more. It hasn't mean more than anything in a very long time. It meant I wasn't going to bail that night. It meant that I'm willing to sit here and talk about it. That's what it meant. Now, please, just… cut me some slack."

The look in Kakashi's eyes was foreign to Tenzo. Wherever he was, it wasn't here. Not in this moment, not in this room, but elsewhere. Doing as he was asked, Tenzo waited patiently for Kakashi to return. The light was gone from his eyes, but his presence of mind had come back. The sight made Tenzo's hair stand on end. He proceeded with caution. "You left for a minute, there."

"Mm." Kakashi sat up and bent his neck to the side, rubbing the aching muscle. Clearly, he didn't want to talk about it. He fell back into his earlier position, this time with his head hanging between his shoulders. Finally, he asked, "Why are we talking about this? You know as well as I do that we could die tomorrow. Tenzo, I'm twenty. I'll be lucky to see my thirtieth. It's a fact of life."

"You're being fatalistic."

"I have to be."

"No, you don't. Look at Lord Hiruzen. He just turned sixty. You're trying to tell me you won't have ten when you could have forty, fifty even."

"That's the exception to the rule, and that's counting retirement. Minato-sensei died at twenty-four! Twenty-four, and he lived almost twice as long as-" Kakashi's voice broke, and he took a breath to steady himself.

Tenzo watched him in silence before asking, almost in a whisper, "Are you that afraid of dying?"

Kakashi laughed, a bitter, barking sound. "Me? No. No, I'm not afraid of it." The air hung heavy in the room. "I should've died a long time ago."

"Are you really telling me that you're so afraid of living? That talking about us, having a serious conversation, isn't even worth it because you think you'll _die?!_ " Tenzo scowled, hands balled into fists so tightly that his fingernails cut into his palms. "Oh, my god, you selfish prick!" He placed both palms on his forehead in disbelief.

"I don't have to listen to this." Kakashi began to stand up, only to be pushed back down by his kouhai.

"Yes, you do. Because, you know what? Yeah, you might die tomorrow. That's no reason for you to avoid me. I'd rather live what I can today than worry about that. I can't live on 'what ifs,' Kakashi. Nobody can." Tenzo swallowed, steadying himself before laying his feelings down as plainly as possible. "I won't live like that. You can wallow and push me away because you think you're going to die, or you can enjoy this because you might live."

"You're wrong." Kakashi's words fell hard enough to shake the earth. "I wouldn't care if it was me, if I died tomorrow, or next week, or next year. It's you." His heart caught in his throat, and he had to choke it back down before he could speak again. "It's a living hell. I can't do it again."

Tenzo's muscles relaxed in realization, and he dropped his offensive. He felt dense for not catching onto it sooner. Of course. He plopped down beside Kakashi on the bed, speechless for the first time that night. He placed his hand on Kakashi's forearm, but he didn't react. Eventually, he asked, "Do you want to talk about it?"

"There's nothing to say." It was clear that he was keeping the emotion out of his voice.

"I didn't mean what I said earlier."

"I know."

"For what it's worth, I'd take the risk."

Kakashi glanced over at Tenzo, who was studying the wooden floor.

"I'm not asking you to answer now. But, at some point, you need to, for my sake."

God, he hated himself. He'd been a total ass, and now Tenzo was blaming himself for something that wasn't even his fault. It made Kakashi want to scream, and he threw his hitai-ate onto the floor as a poor substitute. He sighed and sat up, letting his back fall against the wall. Mismatched eyes tried to look through the ceiling when he said, "You don't want this."

"I'll decide that for myself, thanks."

"No, Tenzo. You don't. Trust me, you don't. You asked me a simple question, and here I am, spiraling because I can't give you a fucking answer. How hard is it to say 'I want to be with you'? I can't even do that. I'm twenty-fucking-years old with the emotional range of a ten-year-old. It's pathetic."

"Kakashi-"

"I'm not a lifelong commitment. I can't even make that commitment to myself! I can't expect you to live with me when I can't live with myself. Sure as hell not for four decades."

"Stop it!" Tenzo snapped, grabbing him by the front of his shirt. He'd thrown his leg over Kakashi's so that he was straddling his thighs, bracing himself on the bed. With a sudden jerk, he tore Kakashi's head from the wall. "Look at me." When he didn't turn his face down, he demanded, "God damn it, Kakashi, look at me!"

The severity of Tenzo's gaze startled Kakashi, who looked at him in reluctance. The hard set of his jaw was uncharacteristic, and he'd never seen so much anger on his serene face. It was enough to rattle him out of the darkest places of his current headspace.

"You want to be with me."

Hesitantly, Kakashi nodded. He'd said as much just moments before.

"I want to be with you. No, don't brush it off. Listen to me. I want to be with you. I don't care how long. I can't promise I won't go anywhere before you, but I'll fight with everything I have not to. What we have, no matter how long we have it, is what I want. I can't make you want it, too. But I'm not leaving by choice. I mean that all the way down to this apartment. If you want me to leave, I will, but I'm not walking out until you make me."

He was dumbfounded. His head spun dizzyingly as he listened to Tenzo, trying to make even a bit of sense out of what was being said. After Minato-sensei's death, he was convinced that the grim reaper hung just behind his shoulder. How could he possibly be someone's reason to live? It was his fault Obito died. He'd murdered Rin. He'd done nothing to save Minato-sensei or Kushina. Didn't Tenzo know that? Of course he did. He'd said as much when, back in ROOT, he tried to use these things to disorient him in battle. Tenzo knew exactly what was going through his head. That terrified him.

"I'm not going anywhere." Tenzo's hands captured either side of his face, directing his gaze forward. "I'm willing to put up with your jealous, sarcastic, stubborn ass for the next forty years. That might make me batshit, but it's true. So I understand if you need some time. I understand if you can't answer me tonight. But I have to know if you're in this or not. At some point, I need you to tell me."

Kakashi reached out and captured Tenzo by the waist, pulling him to his chest. He was shaking. Kakashi's body was betraying him, showing weakness in one of its most obvious forms. This wasn't right. He was supposed to be the collected one, the one who had everything figured out. He shouldn't be the one crying like a child over eloquent words. Yet, they were so much more than that. It was the first positive, tangible thing that had come into his life in years. He literally held it in his hands, and he didn't want to let go.

He pressed his face into the crook of Tenzo's neck, reveling in the scent of sandalwood and pine and rain. Tenzo held him, one hand smoothing the hair on the back of his head reassuringly. Kakashi didn't know how long they stayed this way, but when he lifted his head, the muscles in his neck ached with the movement. He was much calmer now. Grounded – that's what he was. His body felt tethered to the earth in a way it hadn't before.

With a small smile, Tenzo wiped away the paths his tears had left down his cheeks in the short space between his eyes and mask. His eyes were red and tired, but the life had come back into them. Tenzo decided to keep that detail to himself.

"Thank you," Kakashi murmured, his voice husky from stress. He had yet to move his arms away from Tenzo.

"We're okay?" Tenzo asked.

He nodded. "Yeah," he breathed. "We're okay."

"Can you let me go?"

Ruefully, Kakashi shook his head. The look in his eyes was foreign after tears, but he weakly joked, "No. You're going to run off to that Iruka guy."

An open-palmed slap hit him playfully in the shoulder. "Only you…" Tenzo snorted. "You can't hold on to me forever, you know."

"Just watch me."

With an amused sigh, Tenzo let his senpai have his way. Of all the men to fall in love with, of course he'd choose the most difficult.


End file.
